A friend of mine
Used to work in a sporting good shop. A guy in his early 20's comes in, buys a fairly decent pair of trainers, hands over the cash, and walks out. So far, so good.

10 minutes later, he's back. "Can I have another pair of trainers the same please?" he says. Fair enough, my friend goes and gets another pair and starts ringing them up on the till.

"No, these are free" says young customer. "Someone stole my last pair." Expressing disbelief, my friend explains that, no, they are not free, and the customer starts to get abusive.

"You give me my ****ing trainers." No, these are not your trainers, ****ing or not. These are the shop's trainers. Your trainers are in the hands of some 15-year-old scallywag who relieved you of them. They are your trainers because you paid for them, and at that point, they become your responsibility.

Escalation ensued to the point that the police were called to (a) remove him from the shop and (b) explain basic monetary economic theory, preferably through the medium of a swift falling-down-the-stairs if you know what I mean.
( Amish Information Systems hates misplaced, commas, Fri 5 Sep 2008, 11:52, Reply)